Hardware Overview

Frontend System

Figure 1: Two perspective views of the 2.1-m antenna front end feed package

The front end system (Figure 1) consists of a broadband (1-18 GHz) dual-polarization log-periodic crossed-dipole feed, and a thermally-controlled RF box (called the FEM, or Front End Module) that houses the amplifiers, calibration noise source (noise diode), attenuators, and optical transmitters needed to control the gain of the system and supply the two RF signals multiplexed onto a single optical fiber output.

Figure 2: The complete block diagram for the Front End Module (FEM) housed in the RF box